January 4
Air traffic controller's president Ted Lang mentions on national media that he is concerned about the reliance of transponders in light aircraft for separation from jets under the new airspace arrangements

"The new rules allow light planes to share the same airspace as commercial jets"

Errors have been made by controllers on occasions in the past and electronic intervention by transponders do save lives ..even when only passenger jets are involved ...click on link below for the cogent evidence

January 14
An Uzbekistan Airways Soviet-built Yak-40 en route from Termez to the Uzbekistan capital of Tashkent (north of Afghanistan) with 32 passengers and 5 crew on board has crashed while on a very short final to the main airport runway

The aircraft "...appeared to have hit a stanchion of approach lights in heavy fog and flipped over hitting the outside of a wall surrounding the landing area"

The Yak was on it's third landing approach when it hit the fence and exploded - there were no survivors

January 4
Virgin Atlantic run by well known personality - Richard Branson - has made public the 'Virgin Atlantic Global Flyer' a jet powered aircraft capable of flying around the world non-stop for 3 days and on one tank of gas

"Steve Fossett continues to plan another record assault and fellow record-setter Richard Branson is backing him up"

Steve is attempting to be the first solo non-stop non-refuelled circumnavigation of the globe in an aircraft designed by Burt Rutan who was behind the two-man/woman Voyager craft that completed a 9 day circumnavigation in December '86

January 14
An air leak (pressure decay) on the International Space Station - which has been bothering crew and ground controllers for the past week - has been traced to a braided flex hose that forms part of the window system in the US Destiny Laboratory

"..the crew used an ultrasound leak detector device for a second time at the Lab window and detected an audible hissing noise emanating from the flex hose"

"The flex hose is hooked up to quick disconnect devices as part of a system designed to vent into space any condensation between the panes of glass to maintain the window’s optically pristine quality"